Don't exclude private schools from vaccines

Public school officials must inoculate all school age children living in their district.

All children are susceptible to the swine flu, not just kids who go to public schools.

So it is good to see school districts including cyber schools — which are public schools — and home-schooled children in their plans when they send out notices about swine flu inoculations.

But one group is sometimes being left out. Parents of some private school children have complained they are being turned down by public schools when it comes to trying to get their children inoculated with the H1N1 vaccine.

This clearly makes no sense.

The obvious top reason is because the swine flu is not confined to affecting only children who walk the halls of public schools.

Given the seriousness of this current influenza — many children have become extremely ill and a few have died — and the fact that it is so easily spread, all parents need to have the ability to get their children inoculated.

The second reason is who is paying. Everyone, regardless of whether they have children in public or private school — or if they even have kids at all — are paying taxes into the public school district where they live.

The H1N1 vaccine also is being given free to school districts because it was paid for through all our federal tax dollars.

The other reason is simply that the government decided public school districts would be one of the key places where people would gather to get their children immunized. It makes sense and this system seems to be working well, at least in the midstate area.

Some smaller private schools wanted to get the vaccine and would have inoculated their students if they had received the injections or nose spray to do so, but they didn’t. Because of their size that might have made sense. But those students then should not be left out elsewhere.

School officials have an obligation to immunize all school-age children who live in their districts regardless of whether they go to public school there.

But for parents who are not able to get the vaccine through a school district or their family doctor, they should call 877-PA-Health for information.